Rainy Day Insanity

I'd like to say I've worked on digital drawing.

I'd like to say I've written something worthwhile.

I woke up at 8:30, adhering to my new resolution that sleeping in bites ass and I need a schedule of some sort. Despite noon still being early in the day, waking up at noon usually means my brain saying 'aw, fuck it. Day's half over so let's do nothing.' 

Instead, I made coffee and baked cookies. My grandma's recipe for M&M cookies. I looked on the big package of M&Ms I bought and there was also an M&M cookie recipe. I compared the very similar ingredients and scoffed at the different amounts. 3/4 cup of brown sugar? Pfft, amateurs. Nothing short of a cup! 

My cats are shit helpers in the kitchen. After tripping over them a few times, starting to count how many times I tripped over cats then losing count altogether, I took to scooting across the floor and wading through the sea of cats. Two. I have two but I also have two feet and each was clearly assigned to one of them at all times. After making most of the cookies, I end up with not enough dough to fill one last tray so I turned down the heat, made one massive cookie of the rest and decided my nephews could make breakfast out of it.

Made my way upstairs where I went back to punching out borders for my business cards. Fucking sparkle paper everywhere, but I got through the whole stack. I looked at my floor, horrified by the disparity between my ugly ass brown carpet and the pixie-esque paper freckles and dove for the vacuum cleaner.

Once I was sure I was rid of them, I browsed through my Amazon wish list and added some glue dots and roll-on adhesive to the cart. I'll need those to affix these damned borders to the cards, along with the trinket bags. Might have to order printed bookmarks though. Although I like the tassel selection, I rue both the cost of ink and the size selection. 2 1\2" across which just seems about an inch broader than I'd like. Looking to go about 1.5 by 5.5 or 6 on those. The smaller books people buy are about 6 inches in height so exceeding that is inconvenient. Besides, I'd like them coated after printing, both to preserve the print and make them stand up to accidental water or coffee damage.

I've had some people wonder about the borders. I'm not hording the idea like some trade secret so I'll disclose what that's about. I ordered some fairly cheap small origami paper, about 7cm square (though the 7x14 sheets were also good--these are going on the short edge of the card so I don't need a lot of excess). You can pick up a 50 sheet pack for $1 if you're thrifty.  I also ordered a border punch from Walmart, this one a rather simple flower or crown sort of vibe. That went for about $13-14. I have to line up and punch twice to get across the 7cm, so I'd say the actual border punch length is about an inch and a half, give or take a few millimeters. (Don't hate; I use standard and metric like a bastard queen.) On a 7x7 piece I can get about four rows. I stack about two or three of the sheets together at a time. The border punch is pretty sturdy but it doesn't go through heavy cardstock and anything more than three thin sheets is both hell on your hand and risking breaking it. Once the cards are printed, I'll run roll-on glue along the bottom of the border and attach it to the back of the card.

Again, I'll get pictures of that once put together. Feel free to steal my lovely ideas. I doubt I'm the only one to come up with them, but I embrace being extra (and don't really think many people would care to put in the extra work anyway).

I'll keep regular business cards out on my table, but reserve the extras for people who buy something or just talk to me for a bit. I'm not looking to bark at people and make them endure my enthusiasm. Like in real life, I tend to draw people in by my easy-going nature and reserve the enthusiasm for those who engage my interests. At a convention, there are hundreds of other vendors and hawkers wearing people down. I'd rather be people's respite and meet them where they're comfortable.

It's nearly 1:30 as I write this and, as you can tell from the shift to active insanity to informational babbling, my brain is threatening to declare this time 'noon' and squandering the rest of my perfectly productive rainy day. I might not be able to seal my windows just yet, but I might scoot my lazy ass over to my computer and work on my sad pink princess picture for a bit.  If I hadn't worked yesterday I might have done more then. Not that she's going anywhere or serving any purpose. Just a vanity project, which is what I call anything that isn't boosting some specific goal. Everything is portfolio worthy, to be sure, but she's just my excuse to play on the new displays, get used to them and such.

So! Off to attempt to disabuse myself of bad summer habits and try to make something more of the day. Working tomorrow and Dad's birthday is Friday so those will eat up the better part of the next two days, if only because I'm making my dad his favorite kind of cake, carrot cake with cream cheese icing. I'd like to do it by scratch. The store bought icing isn't bad, but I think it's a little too sugary and not enough cream cheese. A rich cream cheese flavor really makes carrot cake amazing.